While computer scientists have been chasing two Holy Grails for
decades—voice recognition and simultaneous translation—with varying levels
of success, a more profound myth has always animated those who see computers
as transforming devices: the idea of the paperless office.

Paper is an extraordinary medium. Lightweight and flexible, it is
high-resolution, supports thousands of typefaces, can present both
black-and-white and color illustrations, and its high contrast makes it very
easy to read. Users of paper documents—whether books, reports or letters—get
a great deal of paralinguistic information from them at first glance. The
layout can indicate quality or esthetic features, the way the text is broken
up can help show the complexity of a document, and the mere thickness of a
book or report gives insight into its contents. The hypertext features of
books—with tables of contents, notes and indexes—make them ideal for
non-linear reading. And books smell good too.

Many attempts have been made to replace and improve on these functions; you
can certainly go further with computers, using full-text search features,
and changing font sizes (which is excellent for those with seeing
disabilities), colors and page layout. But the past few years have shown
that people do not want to read novels on electronic devices, nor do
business people (by far the largest users of paper: 30 to 40% of paper is
used in offices and related needs, such as manuals, directories, etc.) want
to read reports exclusively on them. E-books will be fine for technical
manuals, when the proponents of this technology wake up and realize it.
Anyone building complex products that call for thousands of pages of
documentation would be delighted to have their manuals on PDAs or similar
devices; I would love to see dictionaries and encyclopedias on e-book
readers as well.

This book presents an extremely cogent and unique analysis of the way people
use paper, how it affects and structures organizations, and why paper is
seen as a problem, and shows how this analysis can be directly applied to
the design of e-book readers and document management systems. The authors
point out that, even though they work in advanced research centers, and have
access to most of the available devices for managing information, they are
still surrounded by paper. For them, “the computer is the canvas on which
documents are created, [but] the top of the desk is the palette on which
bits of paper are spread in preparation for the job of writing.”

Curiously, as the technology to manage information becomes increasingly
ubiquitous, paper use increases. While we have access to much more
information, we need to print it “in order for us to read it and make sense
of it.” Figures show an almost linear increase in paper use in recent
decades: “the introduction of new technology does not get rid of paper; it
shifts the ways in which it is used.” More people print out what they access
on the web, their e-mail messages, and the reports they receive. In the
past, such documents were photocopied and circulated; today, they are sent
over computer networks and printed by the receiver.

An interesting case-study examined in this book is that of a Danish company
that wanted to reduce paper use as part of a larger-scale change in company
attitudes. By not adopting an all-or-nothing approach—by not saying that
all paper had to be eliminated—this company was able to “move to a less
papercentric environment”, and reduce the use of paper, yet continue using
paper when necessary. The reduction of paper use served to facilitate the
company’s new work process, and change employee attitudes. While the company
still uses paper for some documents—especially contracts, and projects in
progress—it has reduced its dependence on paper and changed the way it
works.

The structure of this book tends to limit its interest to the “casual”
reader, interested in an examination of how we interact with paper. Several
of its chapters read like research reports, the kind often found in business
books, where case studies are examined. A chapter on air-traffic
controllers, and their use of paper, is by far the most obscure, since few
of us use paper as they do. Nevertheless, the book is well-written, and even
these case studies provide interesting insight into just how much paper is
an integral part of our lives.

The authors’ conclusion to the “problem” of paper is mostly common-sense:
“paper will continue to occupy an important place in office life but will
increasingly be used in conjunction with an array of electronic tools.” They
go on to say, “The paperless office is a myth not because people fail to
achieve their goals, but because they know too well that their goals cannot
be achieved without paper.” Don’t throw away those books yet—the future
won’t be that different after all.

Kirk McElhearn

Kirk McElhearn (kirk@mcelhearn.com) is a freelance writer and translator
living in a village in the French Alps. You can find out all about him at
his web site: http://www.mcelhearn.com.